Gareth held up a finger and quickly darted down the hall to his room. When he returned, he had a large antique book in his hand. Sitting next to me, he flipped the pages until he reached an old painted portrait of ten or so men and women dressed in long black capes. Behind them, several rows of severe-looking men all in black stood at attention.
“The Hetaeria created a new set of laws to ensure that no one faction had more power or more control than any other. They also enlisted other Supernaturals to serve as militia. The Guard, as it was called, was tasked with enforcing the new laws and working as protectors for Supernaturals in peril.” Gareth indicated the photo and sighed heavily. “They’re the ones who hunted down your mother, Lainey.”
I leaned over and studied the faces of the men in the photographs. They didn’t look like killers to me.
“But I don’t understand. If the Hetaeria was created to keep the balance, to be peacekeepers, then what happened to my mom? Why would they or the Guard want to hurt her?” I trailed off, feeling overwhelmed by the complexity of Gareth’s story. “Why would they want to hurt me?”
Gareth closed his eyes for a moment, as if in pain, and then continued. “The Hetaeria was successful in keeping the peace for quite some time, until a young man by the name of Emmett Masterson infiltrated it and began to pervert its mission.”
The ominous tone in Gareth’s voice made me shiver.
“He was power hungry, even from the time he was a young man. He had a cruel nature and saw himself as king of the Supernatural realm.”
“There’s a king?”
Gareth shook his head. “No. That was the purpose of the Hetaeria: to balance the power among the factions. But Masterson sought control of the factions—to hold dominion over them all. He ended up selling his soul to a Sorcerer of Darkness and began using black magic to amplify his abilities. He became incredibly powerful. Then he began to strike down those weaker than himself.”
Gareth took a deep breath, clearly affected by his own story, but steeled himself. “First, he manipulated the Guard. He is incredibly charismatic, you see. He began to poison their minds with talk of a new order, of overthrowing the Hetaeria, of a world united under a single rule: his rule. He quickly gained a following among them, and any who opposed him either fled or were murdered. It wasn’t long until Masterson had overthrown the faction leaders and eradicated the Hetaeria altogether. He dropped the last part of his surname and began calling himself ‘The Master.’”
The Master. My heart skipped a beat. I thought back to my visions of Josephine, of the man cloaked in shadows. Don’t lie to me, you foolish girl. I know you have it . . . and I want it. I shuddered at the memory. It was all starting to make sense now.
Gareth and I were both silent for a moment, lost in our own memories. Then Gareth began to speak again, his voice even once more.
“The Master began using the Guard to hunt down Supernaturals. Witch, Warlock, Shape-Shifter, Nixie—faction didn’t matter. Any who opposed the Master’s reign was disposed of.”
“But they fought back, right?” I interjected. “The other Supernaturals?”
“I’m afraid it wasn’t that simple.” Gareth smiled sadly. “Fear and greed are powerful motivators, Lainey. Without the Hetaeria allying them, the factions drew into themselves, untrusting of each other. There were also a number of Supernaturals who disagreed with the initial creation of the Hetaeria—people who would rather die than see the factions at peace. They didn’t like the fact that the Hetaeria was imposing what they saw as unnecessary laws upon them. The Master allied himself with those people—with those traitors.”
Gareth looked disgusted. “He imbued the members of the Guard with black magic, turning them into assassins. Not only are they deadly, but they’re also damn near indestructible, even for the strongest of our kind. The Master’s greed sparked another bloody civil war—one we’ve been fighting ever since.”
“How is he even still alive?”
“Supernaturals tend to have longer life spans, particularly if they’re powerful. In the Master’s case, his use of dark magic has given him unnatural longevity, even by our standards.”
A sudden dread settled in my stomach. “It was the Master who killed my mom, wasn’t it?
Gareth leaned forward, his piercing brown eyes never straying from my face. “Yes.”
His words from earlier floated back to me. Lainey, she was killed because she was the Keeper, the Keeper of the Grimoire.
I shook my head. “Wait, you told me that my mom was killed because she was the Keeper, right? If the Master is so powerful, why would he need the Grimoire?”
“Magic always leaves a mark,” Gareth said. “And the Master never anticipated the price the black magic he used would exact from him. Over time, his powers began to weaken, only allowing him to sustain small bits of power at a time.”
He flipped back to the page of the original faction representatives and pointed out one of the members—a strapping young man with dark hair that was pulled back in a low ponytail. He looked familiar, but I wasn’t sure I’d ever seen him before.
“That,” Gareth said, “is Lane DuCarmont. He was the representative for the witch and warlock faction. He was also Josephine DuCarmont’s father and the man you were named after.”
I remembered the picture Serena had shown me of the DuCarmont family. In that picture, a much older Lane was calm and relaxed, his arm wrapped around Josephine’s shoulders. In this picture, there was no kindness on his face.
“It’s said that Lane DuCarmont killed a dark sorcerer who was carrying a spell that would allow the Master to bleed magic from other Supernaturals. If he collected magic from every faction, he could use the spell to fuse it all together and be all-powerful—immortal even. No one would be able to stop him.”
“But Lane stole the spell.”
“Yes,” Gareth said, “and contained it in the one place where he knew it would be safe.”
“The DuCarmont Grimoire,” I finished for him.
I thought back to my visions of Josephine. “But Lane knew the Master would kill him for what he’d done, so he made someone else the Keeper, didn’t he? Someone he trusted above all others.”
My mind was busy replaying the scenes of my visions over and over in my mind as the pieces of the puzzle were starting to come together.
Lainey.
The whisper in my ear was hardly a surprise, and I looked over at Josephine’s face for confirmation. “He made Josephine the Keeper, and when the Guard came for Lane and his family, Josephine escaped with the Grimoire.” I looked back over at Gareth and smiled. “She kept it safe.”
“Yes,” Gareth confirmed. “But she sacrificed her own life to do so.”
“What?” I tore my eyes away from Gareth. In the last vision I’d had, Josephine was alive. I looked over at Josephine, whose sad eyes confirmed the truth.
“What happened to you?” I said, standing up and moving toward Josephine. I balled my hands into fists, stirred by conviction. “You have to tell me the rest. I have to see it.”
Josephine nodded and held out her hand.
I was vaguely aware of Gareth’s voice calling my name, but as I reached out to take Josephine’s hand, everything else faded away.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO